vinguist

[vinguist]

To anyone who was suicidal at age 14 or younger, here’s your permission to grieve. Here’s your permission to not joke about it or just flat out ignore it. Here’s your permission to acknowledge that lost child who felt way more pain than any child should ever feel. You’re allowed to cry for that child, whether you healed or are still suffering the same thoughts. Finally allow yourself to grieve for that child filled with undeserved hurt.

[vinguist]

i have understood so many things about online leftist culture by the fact that when i said "your local community has people you will morally and politically disagree with but you cannot lock them out of accessing any tangible service you’re organising" one of the tags responding said "this isn’t about proshippers in here you’re not welcome" like. folks. focus with me. some of us are homeless here.

[vinguist]

Friendly reminder to not punish yourself for creating. 

[vinguist]

Haven't drawn Abbachio yet somehow :v

[vinguist]

Just an FYI. The FDA is not allowed to announce any food recalls due to the health communications pause the current administration enacted. You can still find this information by visiting USDA the site directly.

https://www.fsis.usda.gov/recalls

Here’s the fda link to use to search for recalls, safety alerts, and market withdrawals.

https://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts

So, while you are making your grocery list, you may want to visit the recalls list since there’s no public communication right now.

[vinguist]

Important! Your pet's RFID chip number might have been disconnected this week.

Is your pet chipped? They should be. Do you know who made the chip?

Pet RFID chips are so small that there's really only room on them for a serial number. When your lost pet is brought to a shelter or a vet's office, they can scan the chip, read that number, and then type it into a program that draws from a series of linked databases to find your name and phone number. That's how they find you, and tell you that Silly Lilly von Wigglesbottom has gone wandering, and she's safe and sound, and would you come get her, please?

Texas-based Save This Life, which provided chips to vets and shelters all across the US, has all at once and abruptly gone dark; their database is just gone. Their customers were not given warning and so did not know to change their registration to another company. A lot of animals have basically become anonymous now.

If you don't know what company you've been using, call your vet's office and ask what pet chip number they have on file. If the chip number starts with 991 or 900164, it's probably a Save This Life chip.

If it turns out yours is one of the affected cases, the chip itself will still be fine! There's no need to add another, or anything like that. You'll just need to transfer the number to another company, and your vet should be able to recommend the one that they like the best.

[vinguist]

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but if you let something slide because you were too shocked to react in the moment, you can bring it up the next time you talk to that person, you can text them, you can let them know it won’t slide again in the future. you don’t have to just accept that behavior indefinitely because you couldn’t gather your thoughts to say it made you uncomfortable when it first happened. you’re not making anything awkward, you are giving someone an opportunity to show care for you, and telling them you trust them enough to change their behavior. there is literally nothing wrong or bad with voicing discomfort even if the moment has already passed.

[vinguist]

Two books that inspire knowledge—and action

Book reviews in the link

Food is much more than what we eat; it is a complex system that intertwines the environment, economy, society, and culture. Understanding and interpreting this intricate yet fascinating system can be challenging, but books serve as valuable guides. Today, we recommend two insightful reads that highlight the stories of innovative chefs and sustainable livestock farming practices. Marianne Landzettel’s The Sustainable Meat Challenge explores how quality meat production can go hand in hand with environmental and animal welfare. Meanwhile, Carole Counihan and Susanne Højlund’s Chefs, Restaurants, and Culinary Sustainability provides an overview of sustainable practices embraced by key figures in the restaurant industry. Notably, this book includes a chapter on the Slow Food Cooks’ Alliance in Kenya—a compelling story of collective commitment and activism, as narrated by Michele Fontefrancesco and Dauro Mattia Zocchi, researchers at the University of Gastronomic Sciences.

[vinguist]

Recently I was forced to face a truth about myself, one which I cannot unlearn and has like many other truths has forced me to reframe how I go about my life.

I am not built to be fast.

I am not built to multitask, I am not built for the shortcuts I must take to have speed.

On my most recent day off I ran an experiment, I took things at my own pace.

I didn't multitask and just let things go as I felt they should.

It took me 5 hours to complete the first task of the day, took me 20 minutes to walk when it normally took my 5, it took me sooooo long.

Now, ive shared my findings with a few ppl, and at first glance you might feel the same way too. "Oh your not slow! It's ok!" As if it's some character flaw.

And doesn't that say a lot about the current state of things that this realization was met with so much hostility?

There is no moral judgements to be made about our natural rhythms.

My husband is at 2x speed all the time. He needs to multitasking and have rewards lined up to function he needs to feel the adrenaline in his body to get moving. He needs all his senses engaged and that how he best experiences things. That's just what he needs! And he should get it!

I need to be able to walk slowly and watch the clouds blow past and the flowers bloom and open up, I need my mail to take weeks and to savor the sunlight warmth. I take an entire weekend to make a Chilli, and days to make stock. I need to watch my plants grow and the moons phases to say hello to me. To watch shows and stretch afterwards without the clock ticking away down my throat.

I can find peace in people being on different cycles then me, the major thing for me was realizing what my own was in the first place.

[vinguist]

Dandelion News - February 15-21

Like these weekly compilations? Tip me at $kaybarr1735 or check out my Dandelion Doodles!

1. Solar farms managed for nature boost bird abundance and diversity, new study finds

“There were more than twice as many farmland birds in the well-managed solar farms compared with the intensively farmed land, and nearly 16 times as many woodland birds. […] Overall, diversity was 2.5 times higher, while woodland birds were nine times more diverse.”

2. Washington judge blocks Trump’s gender-affirming care ban, says it's unconstitutional in multiple ways

“This marks the second time in a week that a judge has stood in the way of Trump’s attacks on trans kids. [… The ruling grants] a temporary restraining order that halts enforcement of provisions in Trump’s directive that would cut off federal funding to medical institutions that provide gender-affirming care to minors.”

3. Fog harvesting could provide water for arid cities

“17,000 sq m of mesh could produce enough water to meet the weekly water demand of [… the] urban slums. 110 sq m could meet the annual demand for the irrigation of the city's green spaces. Fog water could be used for soil-free (hydroponic) agriculture, with yields of 33 to 44lb (15 to 20kg) of green vegetables in a month.”

4. Audubon Applauds Bipartisan Federal Effort to Protect Delaware River Basin with Critical Reauthorization Bill

“The bill would […] ensure long-term conservation and restoration efforts, expand the official definition of the basin to include Maryland, and prioritize projects that serve small, rural, and disadvantaged communities. […] The watershed provides important year-round habitats and critical migratory stopovers for approximately 400 bird species[….]”

5. mRNA vaccines show promise in pancreatic cancer in early trial

“Half of the people in the study — eight of the participants — responded to the vaccine, producing T cells that targeted their tumors. […] Just two of the patients who had a response to the vaccine had their cancer return during the three-year follow- up, compared to seven of the eight who did not respond to the vaccine treatments.”

6. Minn. Lt. Gov. Flanagan Makes It Official; She's running for U.S. Senate

“[Flanagan has] “championed kitchen-table issues like raising the minimum wage, paid family and medical leave, and free school meals.” If elected, Flanagan, a tribal citizen of the White Earth Nation, would become the first Native American female U.S. senator in history.”

7. Federal Funding Restored for Low-Income Alabama Utility Assistance After Outcry

“A program meant to help low-income Alabamians pay their utility bills has resumed two weeks after it was canceled due to an executive order from President Donald Trump. […] “We can confirm the funds are reaching those affected by the previous pause[….]””

8. Modeling study suggests Amazon rainforest is more resilient than assumed

“[Previous] studies were either conducted with global climate models that used a simplified representation of convection [or were on a regional scale….] According to the computations, mean annual precipitation in the Amazon does not change significantly even after complete deforestation.“

9. States are moving forward with Buy Clean policies despite Trump reversal

““Buy Clean is a great example of how states and other nonfederal actors can continue to press forward on climate action, regardless of what the federal government does,” said Casey Katims, executive director of the U.S. Climate Alliance, a bipartisan coalition of two dozen governors.”

10. The rewilded golf courses teeming with life

“A wildflower meadow, ponds, scrub habitat, coastline and even an area of peat bog can be found on this little 60-acre (24-hectare) plot, which boasts roe deer, otters, lizards, eels and a huge array of insects and birds.”

February 8-14 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

[vinguist]

goodnight everyone (:

do your daily click

spreadsheet of families in Gaza you can help today

donate to:

Buy an e-sim

Help diabetics in Gaza

The PCRF

Anera

UNRWA

Taawon

Help Gaza Children

Sudan Tarada Initiative

Help a Sudanese family escape conflict

Darfur Women Action

Ramadan for Sudan

Period products in Sudan

Sudan Emergency Appeal

[vinguist]

🦐 <-- this is Jeremie. Please make sure to feed him rocks and minerals

[vinguist]

btw if you have dermatillomania or trichotillomania or onychophagia or rhinotillexomania or any other bfrb i love you & i hope you're having a great day & that you get a good night's sleep tonight

[vinguist]

everything has political content. sorry. theres some guys who get really really angy when you say this but its true

[vinguist]

When a celebrity with more twitter followers than there are Jews on the entire planet can go on an unhinged, extended, and incredibly dangerous antisemitic rant and have people make excuses for him and dismiss it as not that important, or even worse, find it funny, it really shows just how unseriously people take antisemitism and how little people actually care about it.

[vinguist]

there's this well-meaning but I think quite misguided Thing where someone transmasuline whose transition has left them looking, for lack a better term, very conventionally masc - bearded, muscular, liable to be assumed cisgender - will be held up in an argument that essentially goes "lmao you dumbass terfs really want THIS GUY to use the women's bathroom???" as if it's inherently absurd that someone who looks that way would use the women's bathroom. and these tend to get passed around quite a lot to cackle at the stupid terfs who want huge hairy men in women's bathrooms.

and like, let's get one thing straight: no, of course they don't want that guy to use the women's bathroom. they want him to die or detransition; that's their actual goal. they want him to not exist as a trans person. let's just be clear on that.

but the thing that actually bothers me is that this rather steamrolls over the fact that for every transmasuline person who looks like that, there are also transfeminine, nonbinary, and intersex people who look like that and want access to women's bathrooms, and setting up their presence as some kind of absurdity really isn't doing them any favors. nor is it helping the less "passing" trans people who want to use men's bathrooms! this is in fact reinforcing the idea that public bathrooms are a space to be policed based on appearance, that you only gain access to if you can look a certain way.

which is absurd for many reasons, including that it's a fucking bathroom. people are there to piss. ideally anybody should be able to piss next to anybody and we could stop bothering with gender separated bathrooms at all, but in the meantime let's at least not take part in actively encouraging people to decide at a glance who's allowed to piss where.

[vinguist]

Hey remember that a boycott if actually MORE effective under capitalism if you profess you would actually end the boycott under certain conditions.

“Nothing this company does can make up for their bad actions, I will never buy from them again!” Okay so they’ve lost you as a customer and have no reason to try and get you back. You can HOPE to drive them into bankruptcy but Chic-Fil-A is evidence of how well that works.

“This company did something bad. I would not consider buying their product again, UNLESS, they publicly apologized and made up for it by … [donating money to a cause, promoting different content, offering better care to their employees, etc.]” This is actually MORE likely to be effective because if enough people say this, the company m sees them as potential customers of a certain demographic, and is willing to make changes to get those customers back and, long term, make money from them.